Keyed instrument.



No. 779,287. PATBNTBD JAN. s, 19o-5.

E. LAEMBRHIRT.

KEYED INSTRUMENT.

APPLICATION FILED APR. 17, 1902. 3 4SIHIHETS--BHEHT 2.

No. 779,287. PATENTE!) JAN. s, 1905. E. LAEMBRHIRT.

KEYBD INSTRUMENT.

APPLICATION FILED APR.17. 1902 3 SHEETS-SHEET 3.

Patented January 3, 1905.

PATENT OEEICE.

EMIL LAEMERHIRT, OF BERLIN, GERMANY.

KEYED INSTRUMENT.

SPECIFICATION forming part of `Letters Patent No. 779,287, dated January 3, 1905.

Application tiled April 17,1902. Serial No. 103,467.

To /LZ/ whom, it may concern;

Be it known that I, EMIL LAEIERHIRT, a

. subject of the King of Prussia, German E1nperor, and a resident of l2 Veinbergswcg, Berlin, Kingdom of Prussia, German Empire, have invented certain new and useful Improvements in Keyed Instruments, of which the following is an exact specification.

This invention has for purpose to provide means for most advantageously utilizing octave-couplers in keyed instruments and for easily actuating these couplers by means of a stop device; and it consists in the arrangement of additional reeds for the octave-coupler for the last octaves at both ends of the keyboard, in the arrangement of double octave-couplers, and in the device for operating the stops.

My invention is represented in the accompanying drawings, in whichE Figure 1 is a vertical cross-section of the action of a harmonium or organ provided with Iny improvements, said section being taken on line a' of Figs. 2 and 5. Fig. Q is a horizontal section of the instrument. Fig. 3 shows the octave-couplers coupling downward. Fig. 4 shows the octave-couplers coupling upward. Fig. 5 is a plan of part of the under side of the instrument, showing the valves or pallets. Figs. 6, 7, and 8 are detail views showing the operation of the knee-lever.

The additional reeds for the octave-couplers are only for the purpose of obtaining the same eiect in the lowest octave in the bass and in the highest octave in the treble as is obtained by the octave-couplers in the other octaves.

In the drawings the invention is shown, for example, as applied to the bass of a harmonium with two rows of reeds.

8 and 4 are the rows of reeds extending the whole width of the instrument.

w is a pallet, and a is a plunger for actuating the same.

16/a and 8"L are reeds for producing the efects for the lowest bass-octave which are produced by the octave-couplers for the intermediate octaves.

4DL and 2, Fig. 2, are corresponding reeds for the treble octave.

o is the pallet for the reeds 8 and 16', and I) is a plunger for actuating the pallet o.

When the octave-coupler is in action, it can actuate the pallet w by means of the plunger a of the reeds 8 and 4 in the well-known manner.

Then the keys of the last octaves are pressed downward, the reeds 16 and 8a or 4/a and 2, as the case may be, are actuated by the second plunger Z) and the pallet o.

The valve for opening' the wind-chest of the additional reeds may, as shown in the dravings, in small instruments be connected to the octave-coupler. In larger instruments, however, special valves and stops must be at least partly provided for the additional reeds.

The springs fz; for closing the pallets o and w are mounted at an angle to the longitudinal axis of the pallets, as shown in Fig. 5, and prevent lateral displacement of the pallets around the pins o and 1,0', the employment ot' the guide-pin being thus rendered unnecessary.

By means of the above description any one skilled in the art will be able to arrange additional reeds in every instrument. It willbe understood that the additional reeds may be arranged in a wind-chestspecially constructed for the same. In special cases it will be necessary to arrange a lever for transmitting the movement of the keys to the additional reeds or to prolong the keys toward the plungers of the additional reeds.

B v the arrangement of the additional reeds it is consequently attained that the octavecoupler coupling' upward has the same ei'l'ect for the highest octave in the treble as for the other octaves and that the octave coupler coupling downward has the same effect for the lowest octave in the base as for the other octaves. In my new instrument two octavecouplers are arranged. One octave-coupler serves for coupling all the keys upward and the other one for coupling all the keys downward, and, as mentioned above, by the arrangement o'f the additional reeds the lowest keys in the bass can be coupled downward and the highest keys in the treble can be coupled upward. The octave-couplers act in my new instrument equally for all the keys. The octavecouplers consist in the well-known manner of movable boards c and CZ, on which diagonal IOO octave-coupling rods or levers (represented by thin bent lines in Fig. 1) are carried. The lower octave-coupler CZ, coupling downward, is supported by the pillar s. The upper coupler c, coupling upward, is provided on both sides with iiat pieces of iron c' in order to strengthen this coupler and to avoid a deformation of the same. For the same purpose the upper octave-coupler c, besides being pivoted at both ends, is supported (especially in the case of couplers in a keyboard longer than four octaves) by the lower coupler (Z, for which purpose both couplers are provided with parts t, having circular contact-surfaces, so that each of the couplers can be oscillated without the other being moved. The parts Z are advantageously situated in the middle of the octavecoupler boards, so as to perfectly prevent that the upper octave-coupler can bend on account of its own weight.

The advantages of both octave-couplers, which in this instrument form complete registers extending over the whole keyboard, are clearly to be seen, but will possibly not seem important enough to many manufacturers, as both octave-couplers when playing certain notes in the middle octave oi" the keyboard operate together upon these notes. This disadvantage is, however, one of the greatest advantages of the two octave-couplers for the following reason:

If instead of the four-foot and sixteen-foot stops or sets of reeds used up to the present time (by means oi' which only the keys of the lower half of the keyboards could be coupled each to the corresponding keys or' the lower octave and the keys of the upper halt` of the keyboard could be coupled to the correspond ing keys of the upper octave) two octavecouplers are used, each ot' which couples all the keys of the instruments with the keys of the upper or lower octave, respectively, each piece of music sounds absolutely and orchestrally correct.

ln the instruments hitherto constructed the notes on the left-hand side of the center line of the keyboard were coupled downward and the notes on the right-hand side oi' the center line were coupled upward. When playing in the middle octave, part of the notes were consequently coupled to the lower octave and part ot' the notes to the upper octave, whereby an unmusical sounding was produced. This unmusical sounding' is naturally avoided by each octave-coupler coupling all the keys of the instrument either upward or downward.

1n order to be able to easily cause the reeds to speak, and especially the additional reeds in instruments with several rows of reeds, a draw-out stop device, such as is marked g m fp, is provided.

In the drawing, g is a draw-stop rod connected to the stop-head. j) is a hinged bar with a projection for actuating the valves 'for the several stops. f is a spring-influenced rod, provided at its upper end with a lug or projection f2, which in case the stop is pulled out only a little way engages with bar p during the upward swinging of the said bar. The bar y) is hinged to a lixed part, as shown in the drawings, and is swung on its hinge by means of the well-known knee-lever or kneeswell of the instrument. The operation of such a knee-levcr is shown in Figs. 6 to 8, in which 1 .is a lever hinged at 2. 3 is a bar passing through the guides 4f and 5. At 6 an angle-lever 7 is hinged with its end l() to the bar 3. This lever 7 is carried by bearings 8 and 9. The other end, 11, of the lever 7 carries the bar 12 for raising and lowering the hinged bar y). It', lor instance, the lever 1 is turned in the direction indicated by the arrow 13, the joint 6 10 is moved to the left. By doing so the end 11 ot' the angle-lever turning` around its middle part 7, and consequently also the bar 12 and the hinged bar 7), are raised, and inversely. Il the bar 71 swings upward until it engages with the lug on the rod f, the stop connected to the respective rod f is actuated. In order to include a set of reeds or a stop, it is therefore necessary to pull the par ticular stop out a little distance, but only so far that the valve to the wind-chest of that particular set of reeds or stop is not yet opened, while the lug on the rod f is situated in the path of the bar 7), so that in case this bar is moved afterward by means ot' the knee-lever or swell oi: the instrument the rod f is taken along, and thereby the desired stop or set is caused to sound.

1n order to facilitate the drawing out of the stops for setting in the rods f for engagement with the hinged bar 71, sheet-iron levers a may be provided, one arm ot' which can easily be pressed down during the playing by means of one Enger.

1t will be understood that as the other arm of the lever a is situated directly behind the stop it is only necessary to touch the iirstmentioned arm with one finger in order to insure that the stop is set for engagement with the bar p and can consequently be actuated by means of the knee-lever, if and when required. A small pressure against the stophead will effect the cutting out or closing of the respective stop or set or' reeds. The rods f are made in three or at least in two different lengths, (as may be seen in the drawings, in which f is a lug iixed to a rod f, situated behind the rod f to which the lug f2 is fixed) so that as the above-mentioned changes in the position of the knee-lever are effected the irst part of the motion of the knee-lever effects the sounding of the particular stop or set of reeds connected to the rod j carrying the lug j, and the further movement of the knee-lever effects the sounding' of the stop or set of IOO IIO

reeds connected to the rod f carrying the lug f2. At the last or most open position of the knee-swell, however, the couplers, and simultaneously the additional reed-stopwork belonging to the same, are actuated, so that these additional reeds and octave-couplers are always actuated simultaneously.

It will be easily seen what great advantages the new construction of the stop-action device offers in combination with the two octavecouplers and the additional reeds for the same-as, for instance, one of bars f may be connected to the stop for the octave-coupler coupling downward and the other bar f to the stop for the octave-coupler coupling upward, so that after setting the stops for the octave-couplers in engagement with the bar p the octave-couplers can be actuated by means of the knee-lever.

One of the greatest advantages of the new stop-action device is that the stops for each piece of music can be set in advance. In case this is to be done the stops are set for the softest passages and the further different registers are set for engagement with the kneelever-that is to say, the stops of these registers are somewhat pulled out, so that the noses of the respective levers f are situated in the path of the bar p. rl`he knee-lever will therefore have so many distinctive operative positions in its path as there are provided levers f of different lengths.

To the advantages attained by the arrangement of the additional reeds for the octavecouplings of the highest and lowest octave must still be added the advantages arising from 'the fact that instruments constructed according to this invention have always a more uniform tone, embracing two entire additional octaves. A harmonium or organ with four octaves on the keyboard and in the main wind-chests has consequently a compass of fully six octaves. -Therefore a harmonium can be made half an octave or a whole octave shorter, and nevertheless one and a half octaves are gained as compared with the constructious hitherto used. The additional eX- pense entailed by the added reeds is compensated by the saving in the keys, and besides a complete set of sixteen-foot and four-foot reeds is obtained by means of the substitution of the additional reeds for the octave-couplers.

Having thus fully described the nature of my invention, what I desire to secure by Letters Patent of the United States isl. In a keyed instrument, the combination of an octave-coupler coupling all the keys of the keyboard except the keys of the lowest octave in the bass with the respective key of the following lower octave, a second octavecoupler coupling all the keys of the keyboard except the keys of the highest octave in the treble with the respective keys of the following upper octave, a supplemental set of reeds for the lowest octave in the bass, means for coupling the respective supplemental reeds to the reeds of the lowest octave i n the bass, a supplemental set of reeds for the highest octave in the treble and means for coupling the respective supplemental reeds to the reeds of the highest octave in the treble, substantially as described and for the purpose set forth.

2. In a keyed instrument, the combination of a main set of reeds, a supplemental set of reeds for the lowest octave in the bass, a supplemental set of reeds for the highest octave in the treble, an octave-coupler coupling all the keys in the instrument downward, a second coupler coupling all the keys upward and a draw-stop mechanism consisting of drawstops, levers to be actuated by these stops, noses connected to these levers, a hinged bar, a knee-lever for moving' said bar, and means for bringing the stops into the path of thc hinged bar, substantially as described and for the purpose set forth.

3. In a keyed instrument, the combination of an octave-coupler coupling all the keys upward, and an octave-coupler coupling all the keys downward, the octave-coupler coupling upward resting upon the octave-coupler coupling downward by means of circular contactsurfaces, substantially as described and for the purpose set forth.

In testimony whereof I have signed my name to this specification in the presence of two subscribing witnesses.

E MIL LAEMERHIRT.

Witnesses IVOLDEMAR HAUPT, HENRY HAsrER. 

